


What Makes the Ride

by windfallswest



Series: Love or War [15]
Category: Marvel, Marvel 616, New Warriors
Genre: Birthday Fluff, Curtain Fic, Fourth of July, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-04
Updated: 2018-07-04
Packaged: 2019-06-05 00:35:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,453
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15158564
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/windfallswest/pseuds/windfallswest
Summary: While Kaine brushed his teeth, Vance went to see what he had in the fridge. A jar of pickles, half a take-out carton of rice, and four of what were probably the same five beers that had been in there the last time Vance had been over."Breakfast out it is," Vance said under his breath.





	What Makes the Ride

**Author's Note:**

> Have some _Love or War_ birthday!fic, since it's (serendipitously) Vance's actual birthday today!

Vance and Kaine spent the morning dozing together lazily on the couch, enjoying the rising sunlight streaming in through the windows. Or at least until it heated the room enough for things to start getting uncomfortably hot and sticky.

"Air conditioner," Kaine mumbled.

"Hrm?" 

Kaine waved an arm vaguely over their heads. Vance cracked his eyelids to see what he was pointing at. There was, in fact, an air conditioner in one of the windows that he'd missed noticing last night.

"Where'd that come from?" 

"Layton and Meland broke in. Just got central air." Kaine flapped his arm again impatiently. 

Brain still fuzzy, Vance squinted at the air conditioner until he'd hit enough buttons to make it start humming. Kaine let his arm fall back. 

Gradually, the apartment started to cool. Vance and Kaine drifted back towards sleep. Kaine had finally started to relax when the storm dissipated in the small hours of the morning. Vance had found himself unable to stop thinking until dawn began edging out the light pollution in the sky. 

The mission had gone well, insofar as they'd managed what they'd set out to do, although their initial goals had been so far overshadowed by events they'd all but lost sight of them. Other things had been pushed to the side, too. Something had happened to Kaine when he got near the tear in the fabric of reality, and he'd been dangerously close to _something_ when confronting Galactus. 

In some ways, things were back to normal with everyone back on Earth and returning to their lives. In others, they were changing. Rich and possibly Nita and Sam were going to be spending most of their time in space. Faira might not even be coming back. And bringing Elvin on again would certainly mix things up. 

For himself, Vance was just getting an idea of what it was going to be like working and having Kaine so far away, and that was with things fairly quiet on the team front. He'd have to get them moving again, working on their skills and coordination so they were prepared for the next threat. He wanted to reach out to the Jean Grey School again about Aracely; as they'd seen, her powers were still just too unpredictable. 

Exhaustion and sloth eventually lost out to the demands of their bodies. Vance had carbed up before his flight from New York but hadn't eaten since, and his stomach felt like it was about to start attacking his backbone. The need to piss was also starting to become urgent. 

Vance didn't shower again, but he did shave, because if he didn't he looked more like a hobo than a lumberjack. Enough of his clothes had found their way into Kaine's closet by now that he was able to pull together something to wear, although if they went out anyplace he'd have to borrow some shoes. 

While Kaine brushed his teeth, Vance went to see what he had in the fridge. A jar of pickles, half a take-out carton of rice, and four of what were probably the same five beers that had been in there the last time Vance had been over. 

"Breakfast out it is," Vance said under his breath. 

During breakfast out, Vance casually lifted a wallet out of the hands of a pickpocket out on the sidewalk and floated it back to its owner. Kaine raised his eyebrows. Vance returned him a bland look over the rim of his coffee mug. 

"That guy looks like he's about to shit his pants."

"We could probably still catch him," Vance said.

"I was talking about the guy he stole it from."

Vance sighed. "That's one of the reasons for the costumes, you realise. They're disruptive, but they tell people what's going on."

"If you don't mind looking ridiculous." 

"And if you have the legs for it. For all that the Initiative got wrong, the cargo pants were much more forgiving," Vance mused. 

"I was thinking, I might buy a bike," Kaine said as they walked along the sidewalk.

"What kind?" 

Vance had left his own motorcycle in New York, parked by the community centre in Bed-Stuy as sort of a pledge to return and with the optimistic thought that people who knew it was his bike would be less likely to steal it. That meant he and Kaine were on foot unless they wanted to call a cab or fly, not that that was a bad thing. 

Kaine shrugged. "Something with some style. And muscle," he added with anticipatory relish.

Well, Vance supposed he could afford it. Kaine didn't carry a wallet so much as thousand-dollar wads of cash. Given what little Vance knew about his past, he was more than a little suspicious about where it came from. Kaine definitely didn't have a regular job.

"Do you think we should buy some groceries?" Vance asked as they came up on a tiny neighbourhood store.

"Why, didn't you eat enough at breakfast?"

"I was thinking of breakfast tomorrow." Dinner they could order in. They had basically just eaten lunch. 

Upon consideration, Kaine's solution was to buy a box of pastries from a nearby bakery. Vance vetoed the bagels, on the grounds that you just couldn't get good ones outside of New York City. Logically, the Mexican did get better the closer you got to Mexico, though, as long as you avoided Taco Bell.

They were still a little tired, so when they got back, they went to bed. They didn't spend the _entire_ day having sex, although it was an attractive idea. Vance brought the news up on his phone—he was almost caught up; they hadn't been away all that long, really—while Kaine sat at the other end of the couch channel surfing. Kaine's taste in programming was predictably violent. He also had a tendency when watching grappling or MMA to try and teach himself holds using Vance as a living dummy. 

The only seating in Kaine's apartment was still the couch, because Kaine would apparently just as soon stick to the walls. Vance hopped up on the kitchen island near where he was perched. They were just starting to explore the possibilities of the decent-sized counter surface when Aracely knocked at the window and told them they were going to patrol with her. 

"Also, don't do that on the counter. People eat there," she added.

"Only us," Kaine muttered.

He launched himself in a flip that landed halfway to the bedroom. Vance wouldn't have risked it; he was lucky he hadn't gone through the floor in this rat-trap. He clambered down more prudently, blushing at being caught. 

"Happy birthday!" Aracely greeted him when they joined her out on the fire escape. "Annabelle and I saw you save the plane. You should have cake!"

Instead, they ferreted out a fair smattering of muggers and one arsonist who almost got the job done anyway when Aracely flipped the switch from _empath_ to _emits fire_. Half of that was before they even got out of Kaine's neighbourhood. Vance had to admit, the commute was short.

Aracely ditched them around one. "Annabelle and I are going to a club," she announced.

"Is she old enough to go clubbing?" Vance asked as she zoomed away into the half-haze of light pollution. 

"She's old enough to go rocketing into space and let planet-eating weirdoes into her head," Kaine pointed out. 

Borrowing a pair of Kaine's sneakers, Vance made it out for a run the next morning. He was still learning the streets around Kaine's building. This wasn't actually the worst neighbourhood Vance had ever seen, although his white Jewish self definitely stood out. The first time he'd gone jogging here in the evening, several members of a street gang had tried to impress him. He'd ended up leaving a small pile of guns on the roof of the nearest police precinct; it was an occasional hobby of his. If any of them were actually legal, the cops could return them to their owners. 

On his last leg, he picked up some breakfast that resembled actual food. Kaine had been gone when he woke up, but he was back and had found the second take-out container in the refrigerator by the time Vance finished his shower. 

He never did manage to get dressed again. Kaine peeled the towel from around his hips—Kaine had surprisingly nice towels, although they looked like they'd been stolen from a fancy hotel—and licked water from his neck as they rubbed against each other. It was a nice thank-you for breakfast, since Kaine preferred not to use his words.

After, Vance stirred drowsily in the now-damp sheets. Kaine had slumped over to one side, stretched out in self-satisfied afterglow. Disentangling their limbs, Vance nudged Kaine over onto his stomach, eliciting a sound that didn't quite make it all the way to aggravated. 

"What are you doing?"

"Giving you a massage," Vance said.

The sound this time was interested, as Vance started working on the rock-hard tension in his shoulders. _You'd think he'd be a_ little _loose by this point._

He was at least lying still for it, which was definitely the trick with Kaine; and since his admission in the darkness of the rogue orphan planetoid, Vance was starting to understand a little of why. Kaine didn't accept pleasure party because he didn't understand it. It was one of several things he'd gone most of his life without, including, if Vance was reading between the lines right, sanity and a sense of hope and self-worth. 

The thought sparked something in Vance almost as angry as it was tender. He leaned into a knot in Kaine's shoulder, carefully calculating the balance between pressure and pleasure. Vance's world narrowed down to the reflexive shifting of that strong back and coaxing out those low hums of satisfaction. They rumbled under his hands with a tangible vibration. Getting anywhere with Kaine's spider-strong muscles necessitated cheating, but the results were worth it. He wished he had oil, too. The prospect of oiling Kaine up held tremendous appeal, actually.

_Next time,_ Vance promised himself, leaning in closer and closer as he worked his way down to the dip of Kaine's lower back and the tempting swell of his ass, which was as impressively muscular as the rest of him. 

Kaine was gratifyingly relaxed now. Vance lingered, stroking the skin at the backs and insides of his thighs, thin and sensitive, fitting smoothly over the powerfully-defined muscles. When he pressed a wet kiss there, he could feel the muscle shifting against his lips. He could taste sweat and come they'd never cleaned off earlier. 

His breath on the damp skin raised goosebumps, and Kaine inched his legs wider. Vance picked another spot, slightly higher up, and set his open mouth there, sucking gently. He used his teeth only lightly, coaxing out a louder moan. 

Continuing on up, Vance laved Kaine's balls with broad strokes of his tongue. Under his hands, Kaine's ass flexed as his hips hitched against the mattress, evidence he was growing hard again. 

Vance took his time, making no effort to constrain Kaine's movements as he mouthed Kaine's balls, then drifted on to the root of his cock and the increasingly sensitive areas behind it. Kaine's breathing stuttered when Vance used his grip on his ass to part his cheeks and expose his final target.

With only a slight hesitation for never having done this before, Vance kissed the last taut muscle in Kaine's body. The raw, amazed sound Kaine made into the pillows drew an answering moan from Vance. With increasing confidence, he laid wet, sucking kisses on Kaine's hole. 

Kaine was swearing now; Vance couldn't make out what exactly he was saying, muffled as he was, but he definitely recognised the sound of Kaine swearing. He was grinding back into Vance's face; Vance's cheeks were wet with spit and his jaw was starting to ache, but he couldn't have backed off if he wanted to, amazed and overcome by the noises that Kaine was pouring into the sheets. 

A ripping sound said they weren't holding up to Kaine's grasping hands. Vance reached up with a thought to shape something for him to hold onto before he reached for the wall and pulled it down on top of them.

Kaine's grip was brutal. He wrung the handholds as Vance ate him out, back curving as he pushed up onto his knees, trying to get more. Vance made a noise embarrassingly close to a whimper himself, sucking at his rim before licking in again.

Kaine made a punched-out noise when he came, shooting all over the already ruined sheets. After a panting minute, he reached his arms over his head and stretched his back, tipping a little to the side.

Vance lifted his face, his eyes wide. That had totally blown all his expectations out of the water. Kaine looked—god. 

Vance realised he was stunningly hard. A sound of desperate relief escaped his throat when he closed his hand around himself. Kaine tilted over a little further, curiosity stirred. A predatory light flashed in his heavy-lidded eyes.

He bowled Vance over backwards in an easy, fluid surge, his body loose and unconstrained, and sealed their mouths together, growling into the kiss. Vance found his hands pinned up by his head.

He squirmed. "That should be way more disgusting than hot."

Kaine dismissed that with a snort. He pressed Vance's wrists more firmly into the mattress. "My turn." He widened his stance, letting Vance's leaking cock rub up against his ass. "Did you get me wet enough, or do we need lube?"

The tube shot out from under the bed. After a moment to process that Kaine's hands weren't moving, the tube unscrewed itself and squeezed out over Vance's dick. He smeared it around, bucking into his own phantom touch.

"Cheating," Kaine chided.

He seized Vance's cock in his warm, real hand and started sinking onto it. He did it fast, because of course he did. Vance was distantly glad he'd worked him open so well and been sloppy with the lube. Mostly, though, he was completely overwhelmed by the sudden feeling of Kaine around him.

Kaine slid his hands down to his shoulders. He was just starting to move when Vance's phone went off and Lady Gaga, irrationally, started telling him to stop calling.

"Shit-eating son of a whore," Kaine groaned, leaning down to keep him pinned. 

As if he were going anywhere. Vance could use his telekinesis for a lot of things, but touch screens took a bit of finessing. Really, it was simplest to bounce the damned thing out of the room and maybe jam it down between the cushions on the couch. 

Kaine groaned out a series of low, half-breathed chuckles. 

"Shut up," Vance told him and knocked out Kaine's elbow to bring his mouth down to where he could stop it with his own. 

Kaine ran hands spread wide up Vance's chest, his cock growing hard again between them. Stubble scraped against Vance's neck. 

They moved together, lost in each other until Kaine shouted and came. Vance felt so close that anything might set him off, Kaine's legs flexing, his beard prickling Vance's skin, a breath exhaled into the sweaty hollow of his throat. 

Kaine leaned back, Vance's cock slipping in even deeper. A ragged moan tore its way out of Vance's throat as his back arched and orgasm flashed through him like tripping a breaker. He was burned out.

He wasn't entirely sure he _could_ move again, if Kaine ever decided to let him up. The prospect seemed distinctly unappealing. Kaine seemed to be of the same mind, since he'd sort of curled up around him. Suffocation had never been so pleasant. 

Vance's incipient doze was interrupted by the sound of Lady Gaga wailing at him again from the depths of the couch. _I really have to change that ringtone._ Reluctantly, he retrieved it and dragged a hand away from Kaine to answer it.

"Robbie?"

"Oh my god, are you two still in bed?" Robbie asked incredulously. 

"What do you want?"

"I thought afterglow was supposed to improve your mood. You didn't actually answer the phone in the middle of—"

"Robbie." Vance muffled a yawn with the back of the hand holding the phone, then brought it back to his ear.

"—brought the mountain down to Houston because it was in the way of a fireworks crew. Well, we're way off Galveston, actually; same reason. Everyone's coming in to watch fireworks and eat birthday cake, but if you don't shower first, you don't get any."

Vance rolled his eyes. "Later, Robbie."

Kaine lifted his head to give Vance a reproachful look.

"I tried to leave them in New York," Vance said defensively. 

Kaine grunted, unmoved.

 

Vance flew them out over the bays and island breakwaters to where the Citadel stood in all its asymmetrical glory at the summit of Mount Wundagore. Kaine refused to wear his costume, and Vance let himself be persuaded not to put his back on, either. This was a social gathering, not a fight. Besides, Vance had a spare in his room at the mountain. 

To Vance's surprise, Rich and Nita were in the rec room where the team had gathered out of the broiling heat. Most of them were in street clothes, which was weird, especially after they'd all spent so much time in costume lately.

Kaine split off to be surly and monosyllabic with Faira and Sil. Vance was more than a little surprised to see Faira, too. He smiled to himself. His nascent plans to get them instructing the others in hand-to-hand reawakened in the back of his mind.

Aracely jumped on Kaine first, then bounced over to squeeze Vance in a rib-bruising hug. _Maybe we should get her tested for super-strength._

Rich came up and clapped his back in a brief hug. "Dude, the New Warriors are based in Texas now? How long have I been away?"

Nita hugged him too and kissed him on the cheek. "Happy birthday, Super-Tights."

With his arm reattached and a few weeks to rest, Rich was looking much more life-like, if about ten years older than Vance remembered. And the last time Vance had seen him he'd already looked like he'd aged five years since leaving Earth. There were glints of silver in his hair, catching the light through the huge, panoramic windows. Vance didn't say anything, but he did make a bet with himself on how long it would take Robbie to notice and start cranking out tasteless old man jokes again. 

"Well, New York was getting kind of crowded," Vance said. 

"Tell me about it," Rich said. "I left Rob at the mercy of our parents. He's got his own powers now, and I can't protect him forever."

"And Texas has better hats," Robbie interjected. "In case you're contemplating a redesign."

"Yes, I'm never so glad that you're broke as when we go past a store selling hats when we're in Texas," Vance told him. 

Robbie stuck his tongue out at him. "Hey, Aracely already told us about your grand entrance. I bet they're still showing it on local news."

He shoved a newspaper at Vance. He'd actually made it to the front page, albeit below the fold. He felt his smile go a little sideways as he read the headline.

_**Come Fly the Friendly Skies** _   
_F. Maharassa_

_Houston George W. Bush Intercontinental Airport was the site of some early Fourth of July fireworks last night. But don't worry: they weren't the result of a crash or unauthorised shenanigans. In fact, the truth is exactly the opposite._

_Swiss Air flight 414, scheduled to arrive in Houston at 7:26 pm last evening, was en route from Rio de Janeiro when the scattered thunderstorms predicted earlier in the day blossomed into a multi-cell monstrosity that blanketed the entire metropolitan area. Due to an administrative misunderstanding at their point of departure, flight 414 was running light on fuel, leaving its pilots no choice but to brave the storm._

_Just as Captain Martin Crieff, an unassuming man who freely admits he prefers to play it safe, steered his plane and its three hundred passengers into the ten-mile-high thunderhead, disaster struck! Or it might have been a bird or a particularly large chunk of hail. While engineers are still working to determine the exact cause, what is known is that the Boeing 777's right engine ceased functioning as passengers and crews plunged into the pitch-black turbulence of the lightning-streaked clouds._

_Even though planes are designed to cope with the loss of an engine while in flight—it's one of the reasons jet aircraft have at least two, after all—this was bad news for Captain Crieff._

_"What with the turbulence, the heavy load, and the conditions on the runway, a pilot really prefers to have the plane completely intact when going in for a landing."_

_But just when things start looking grim, air traffic control (referred to by those who fly as ATC) contacts our panicking pilots and tells them that help is on the way. Superhero Justice (white within a tressure azure conjoined to a demi-pale en chevron, azure an ente en pointe reversed, overall or and azure a mullet party per chevron reversed) is a telekinetic mutant and former Avenger. Yesterday, he was flying from New York down to Houston for, in his own words, "personal, not professional, reasons." Well, it certainly wasn't for the weather._

_"I like to check in with ATC on longer flights," Justice explains how air traffic control knew he was in the area. "Sometimes I have a chance to help out."_

_He certainly did last night. Diving into the raging storm, blind but for ATC's guidance, he found the plane and brought it safely through the savage clouds. Arresting the plane in mid-air, Justice then proceeded to lower one of the world's largest twinjets to its final destination: the Houston-Bush runway._

_The plane's landing gear was only feet from the ground when lightning struck—literally. Both plane and superhero were hit, although it seems that the plane had slightly better grounding. Airport personnel on site, including the emergency crews who examined Justice afterwards, report he fell out of the sky following the strike._

_Passengers and crew of flight 414 were badly jolted in their seats, but Justice managed to set the plane down safely before he lost consciousness. Captain Crieff was able to taxi the plane in to its assigned gate before 8 o'clock._

_Afterwards, Justice recovered enough to give this reporter a short interview. This isn't his first visit to Houston. Last fall, he was witnessed helping the Scarlet Spider (gule, a spider sable conjoined with chief) bring an end to Choke's final rampage across the city. So this reporter wouldn't be surprised if we saw more of his star in the Lone Star State._

Well. That could have been...worse. _Right?_ Maharassa had certainly been...enthusiastic.

Vance's phone buzzed in his pocked. He pulled it out and checked the caller ID. "Hey, Sam. What's up?"

"Hey, Vance! Happy birthday. Sorry I can't make it, but we're doing a family thing."

"Yeah, Mark couldn't come either. Don't worry about it," Vance told him.

"Oh, did he finally go back to see his folks?" Sam asked.

"Yeah. Selah says they're dealing. I've seen Mark a couple times since we've been back and he seems to be doing okay."

"That's great! It would have sucked if they were still freaking out." A child's voice shouted something in the background. "I'm on the phone!" Sam shouted back, not quite getting the receiver far enough from his mouth.

"Hey, I'll let you get back to it," Vance said. "Thanks for calling."

"Bye!"

"Happy birthday."

Vance looked up at the unfamiliar voice. "Oh. Hey, Elvin."

All four feet eleven inches of him rolled up. He still had the body language of a three-fifty bruiser, even though his powers were switched off.

"Consider this your present." Elvin pointed to himself. "I called off work to come fifteen hundred miles in a teleporting mountain so I could stand around looking like a twelve-year-old. No offense, but the cake had better be spectacular."

"I'm pretty sure all this is Robbie's doing, so all bets are off," Vance told him. "Are you getting used to it?"

Elvin shook his head. "Not even a little bit. I'm faster changing, though."

Robbie had found a local news show, although it was cycling through business updates instead of human interest pieces.

"—Parker of Parker Industries unveiled his company's new innovation at a press conference earlier in the week," the anchor-woman said.

Selah had evidently been persuaded to give Mark and his family a little space for the day. Well, she was a bit overenthusiastic, but she wasn't actually _completely_ socially tone-deaf. 

Selah had been sitting perched on one arm of the sectional, waiting for the show to start. Now, she braced an arm on the back and leaned in to peer at the fifty-inch screen. Across the room, Kaine's head snapped around a fraction of a second before she spoke.

"Hey, you know, this guy on the TV looks a lot like Kaine."

Robbie, whose attention had wandered, turned it back on the guy at the podium. His eyes narrowed in thought. Yes, Vance thought, with some chagrin, he'd seen that face before.

"Wait, Kaine, didn't someone say you were a clone of Spider-Man?" The full implications of what he was saying didn't hit Robbie until it was too late. From the expression on his face, he was having one of those moments when he wished he could just suck the words right back into his mouth.

There was stunned silence all around.

It was Selah who spoke first, determination winning out over the shock. That was going to be one of the reasons she made it in this business. "Code of silence, right?"

"Right," Vance said firmly, although he was still reeling a little himself. "I don't think I need to tell any of you that people who keep their identities secret do it for a reason." 

He nodded at Elvin, whose grandmother had been killed when a bad guy found out his identity. Elvin crossed his arms. Okay, so the intimidation factor did suffer considerably in his current circumstances. 

The cake was actually pretty spectacular. Vance stood staring at it before he found his voice.

"How did you get it to _look_ like that?"

"YouTube!" Robbie said, clearly happy to have scored such a direct hit.

"It's covered in a melted chocolate glaze," Selah said dreamily. "I sent the disaster twins out of the kitchen when it was time to decorate it."

"What did you say, woman?" Elvin said.

"You heard me." 

It was a...space cake, dark blue with streaks of green, red, and purple, and little flecks of white speckled across its surface like stars, made even more impressive by being big enough to feed a dozen superheroes. When Selah cut into it, the inside was dark chocolate dotted with white sprinkles.

"Wow. You really went all out. I don't know what to say."

"Well, you deserve a little something for helping to save the universe," Robbie said. "And so do we."

"Can't argue with that. I still get the first piece though, right?"

"Looks like we finally have someone on the team who can cook," Sil said.

"Wait!" Rich said. "We forgot the singing."

"I was hoping we'd keep forgetting it," Sil said under her breath. 

Everything was going well for a change. The cake tasted as spectacular as it looked; no personality conflicts had spawned intra-team brawls as of yet, and the fireworks were about to start. 

Vance should have known better. Some things were just a fact of superhero life.

"What is it?" he asked Jake Waffles when an alarm from the bridge-cum-control centre cut through Robbie's party mix. 

Waffles had already activated one of the computer terminals. "All reading as humans. The energy profiles on their tech matches up to—"

"Hydra," Vance said disgustedly.

"Because who else would start up on the Fourth of July?" Robbie observed, tone and expression sour. 

"Time for some fireworks," Rich said, pulling his helmet out of his back pocket.

Vance was already fishing his com out of his own jeans; no time to change. Looking up, he caught Kaine's gaze. Kaine rolled his eyes; Vance had to swallow a laugh.

"All right, people. Let's show Hydra how we deal with party crashers." 

It wasn't a long fight. Hydra had clearly not been expecting the new Rich, for one thing; and they seemed to have based their planning on that stupid damn reality show, for another. 

Vance groaned inwardly when a helicopter filming the fireworks that were just starting up noticed their more impromptu display and started drifting in their direction. "Let's wrap this up, people."

"Camera-shy, birthday boy?" Rich asked.

"I think I've been in the news enough for one week."

From her position atop the Citadel, Sil opened a darkforce portal to intercept Robbie and send him ricocheting between two hovercraft coming in for an attack run on Vance. Kaine, who had just landed on one of them, flattened himself to its side to keep from being jarred loose. 

"Watch where you're going, bubble-head!"

Kaine slung himself over the side into the craft and punched out the Hydra pilot. The hovercraft immediately went out of control (Kaine's piloting skills: non-existent), and Rich swooped in to contain it. Ever practical, Kaine punched out the controls, too, and Rich set the disabled hovercraft on the Citadel's landing platform, where Kaine prudently immobilised the unconscious Hydra pilot with webbing. 

Vance dodged most of the laser-barrage from the other hovercraft as it was jolted off-course, but a few clipped him. Even through his shield, that stung. 

Selah came looping up behind them, firing light blasts and dividing their attention. Vance hit the craft's laser guns first, but they tried to make a break for it and he grabbed the chassis to keep it from getting away.

"Need a hand, Super-Tights?" Nita asked.

"If you're not too busy." 

She dove into the open cab and started punching. "Well, there was this party I was going to..."

Vance steadied the craft, glancing around to see Rich and Aracely providing aerial support while the non-flyers deal with a contingent that had managed to sneak around and land on the platform. In his peripheral vision, he saw a fan of sparks bloom and fade as the fireworks began.

Between them, Selah and Nita had put out the Hydra operatives in their hovercraft, and Vance waved them on to join the fight while he guided it in. The news helicopter was edging closer now that the dog-fighting was over. Luckily, it didn't catch any stray shots as they subdued the last of the attack force. Maybe it was just something you had to get used to with a telepath on the team, but Vance still found it unsettling when a grown supervillain suddenly shrieked and curled into a foetal ball after a five-second staring contest with Aracely.

Vance's head came up when he heard more helicopters approaching, but these had SHIELD logos emblazoned on their sides. They ran off the news crew, discouraging a couple of others that had been scrambled for competing coverage.

SHIELD was maybe a little more impressed than was flattering that they had managed to handle the situation on their own, but at least they'd responded to Jake Waffles' call. Vance figured they could ignore the attitude so long as SHIELD was willing to take the Hydra goons and assorted detritus off their hands. 

He pulled Aracely away from a staring contest with a junior SHIELD agent just before the danger mark. She stuck her tongue out in final commentary. Selah was snickering. 

The fireworks were still going on. With a sigh, Vance turned his back on the departing SHIELD agents and walked over to where Kaine was lurking crouched on the post-modern exterior of the control room. 

"You know—" Vance said, resting his head on Kaine's shoulder. 

"If you say anything about not wearing our costumes, I'll throw you into the Gulf of Mexico," Kaine warned. His arm had somehow found its way around Vance's waist. 

"At least we didn't miss the fireworks." 

Kaine turned and gave him a hard look. Vance managed to keep a straight face for about fifteen seconds before cracking up. Although Kaine tried to keep scowling, his lips were twitching up at the corners. He poked Vance in the ribs.

"Your sense of humour is fucking terrible."

**Author's Note:**

> Love doesn't make the world go 'round. Love is what makes the ride worthwhile.   
> _—Franklin P. Jones_


End file.
